SteamOS beta adds legacy BIOS, official dual-boot support

Valve's beta software adds features already popular in the modding community.

Just a couple of weeks after picking up support for Intel and AMD graphics, Valve's SteamOS beta has added two more oft-requested features: support for legacy BIOS systems via a new ISO-based installer and official support for dual-booting when installing the operating system in "expert mode." Previous versions of the SteamOS beta required a motherboard with UEFI support, and while dual-booting was possible, it wasn't easy to configure.

Both of these features had been supported by the modding community for a while now, and Valve has apparently used some of that work in this build. The new features were added from an alternate SteamOS distribution called Ye Olde SteamOSe, which has offered BIOS support, an expanded library of default drivers, the ability to run in a virtual machine, and a few other niceties for a couple of months now. As Valve continues work on the official build of SteamOS, we wouldn't be surprised to see more community-added features incorporated. If someone else has already gotten it working, why duplicate their effort?

We don't know when the final version of SteamOS will launch, but we know it will come on at least 13 different Steam Machines from Valve's partners. Many of those devices were first shown off at this year's CES.

Contrary to booting from old BIOS or dualbooting, that's one thing that doesn't work well (or at all) under other linux distributions so I wouldn't hold my breath there - that's in a completely different league from a technical point of view.

Although it does seem like a reasonable thing to invest manhours into. Hope dies last!

If Netflix would get their act together and get their HTML5 player up and running I'd install this on my HTPC... But until that happens it's only going to be any good for toying around. But that's just me. If I didn't need Netflix support I'd install it today -- or now that it can dual boot I'd install it for fun side-by-side if I had the storage space. Speaking of which, I'll have to see how much space the install is..

Contrary to booting from old BIOS or dualbooting, that's one thing that doesn't work well (or at all) under other linux distributions so I wouldn't hold my breath there - that's in a completely different league from a technical point of view.

Although it does seem like a reasonable thing to invest manhours into. Hope dies last!

I realize that it will take a while, but my only other option is to install bumblebee, which would involve manually rm-ing every nvidia entry in rescue mode, which would take hours.

Will the new installer with the "advanced options" for dual booting allow me to install SteamOS on a partition smaller than the 500 GB in the initial requirements?

I would much prefer to install it on a 120 GB SSD I have laying around. I'll be streaming games anyway once that options appears (beta invites are going out now) and don´t need half a gig for local games...

If Netflix would get their act together and get their HTML5 player up and running I'd install this on my HTPC... But until that happens it's only going to be any good for toying around. But that's just me. If I didn't need Netflix support I'd install it today -- or now that it can dual boot I'd install it for fun side-by-side if I had the storage space. Speaking of which, I'll have to see how much space the install is..

Why would you need to? Isn't there a Flash option for Netflix? And isn't Flash widely available on Linux?

If Netflix would get their act together and get their HTML5 player up and running I'd install this on my HTPC... But until that happens it's only going to be any good for toying around. But that's just me. If I didn't need Netflix support I'd install it today -- or now that it can dual boot I'd install it for fun side-by-side if I had the storage space. Speaking of which, I'll have to see how much space the install is..

Why would you need to? Isn't there a Flash option for Netflix? And isn't Flash widely available on Linux?

If Netflix would get their act together and get their HTML5 player up and running I'd install this on my HTPC... But until that happens it's only going to be any good for toying around. But that's just me. If I didn't need Netflix support I'd install it today -- or now that it can dual boot I'd install it for fun side-by-side if I had the storage space. Speaking of which, I'll have to see how much space the install is..

Why would you need to? Isn't there a Flash option for Netflix? And isn't Flash widely available on Linux?

(honest questions, no trolling intended!)

/J

Unless something has changed since I last looked: Netflix has never run on flash, always on Silverlight, due to perceived better support for DRM in Silverlight by content companies.

Will the new installer with the "advanced options" for dual booting allow me to install SteamOS on a partition smaller than the 500 GB in the initial requirements?

I would much prefer to install it on a 120 GB SSD I have laying around. I'll be streaming games anyway once that options appears (beta invites are going out now) and don´t need half a gig for local games...

/J

The installer has never actually checked drive size. I think the OS itself needs something like 40GB for itself and the recovery partition and all - it's installed just fine on 120GB drives for me.

If Netflix would get their act together and get their HTML5 player up and running I'd install this on my HTPC... But until that happens it's only going to be any good for toying around. But that's just me. If I didn't need Netflix support I'd install it today -- or now that it can dual boot I'd install it for fun side-by-side if I had the storage space. Speaking of which, I'll have to see how much space the install is..

Why would you need to? Isn't there a Flash option for Netflix? And isn't Flash widely available on Linux?

(honest questions, no trolling intended!)

/J

Yes, Netflix streaming will work in Linux. Go to the link below and everything will be explained. This system does work very well and is easy to install.

If Netflix would get their act together and get their HTML5 player up and running I'd install this on my HTPC

And even if they did move to HTML5, you'd have to hope that the DCE module they use for decrypting the DRM would even be available for Linux.

I suspect it never will be because there's no guarantee, ever, of a video/audio path that is secure against the end-user. DCE/HTML5 DRM requires user-hostile platforms, and so far SteamOS (and every other Linux platform) is anything but.

The new features were added from an alternate SteamOS distribution called Ye Olde SteamOSe, which has offered BIOS support, an expanded library of default drivers, the ability to run in a virtual machine, and a few other niceties for a couple of months now.

I'm pretty glad to see that. Hopefully Valve incorporates other great community mods. That could be a real strength for the OS. People keep wondering "Why SteamOS, why Linux?", and the answer is flexibility and quick updates. If it takes off, it won't just be a platform, it will be more like an ecosystem.

What I want to know is, did Valve use the modder's code/work without compensation or at least attribution? Or did they pay for the work, even if it was open sourced afterwards. If the modders' work(s) were used to improve SteamOS, it would be the right thing (as well as good marketing/PR) to compensate the modders.

However, that could burn them in the future, should someone decide to try to sue over a similar feature implementation, etc.

Maybe they could post feature requests with a bounty? with modifiers based upon quality of code

If Netflix would get their act together and get their HTML5 player up and running I'd install this on my HTPC

And even if they did move to HTML5, you'd have to <i>hope</i> that the DCE module they use for decrypting the DRM would even be available for Linux.

I suspect it never will be because there's no guarantee, ever, of a video/audio path that is secure against the end-user. DCE/HTML5 DRM requires user-hostile platforms, and so far SteamOS (and every other Linux platform) is anything but.

Netflix works fine on ChromeOS which does not have silverlight at all, so I am quite confident that a non silverlight/moonlight solution will be found for Linux as well.

If Netflix would get their act together and get their HTML5 player up and running I'd install this on my HTPC

And even if they did move to HTML5, you'd have to <i>hope</i> that the DCE module they use for decrypting the DRM would even be available for Linux.

I suspect it never will be because there's no guarantee, ever, of a video/audio path that is secure against the end-user. DCE/HTML5 DRM requires user-hostile platforms, and so far SteamOS (and every other Linux platform) is anything but.

Netflix works fine on ChromeOS which does not have silverlight at all, so I am quite confident that a non silverlight/moonlight solution will be found for Linux as well.

It works fine in Ubuntu also using the easy steps I commented on before. I can't speak of other Linux distros but it should work on them also.

If Netflix would get their act together and get their HTML5 player up and running I'd install this on my HTPC

And even if they did move to HTML5, you'd have to <i>hope</i> that the DCE module they use for decrypting the DRM would even be available for Linux.

I suspect it never will be because there's no guarantee, ever, of a video/audio path that is secure against the end-user. DCE/HTML5 DRM requires user-hostile platforms, and so far SteamOS (and every other Linux platform) is anything but.

Netflix works fine on ChromeOS which does not have silverlight at all, so I am quite confident that a non silverlight/moonlight solution will be found for Linux as well.

I've seen people running it on nix systems with pipelight.. As for Netflix running in ChromeOS.. That doesnt really mean much as it already works in IE11 on windows 8.1 in HTML5 mode too.. but clearly there is some kind of specific built in DRM features that make it non compatible with normal HTML5 browsers (some kind of plugin?). So my guess is that Google has merely done the same thing in ChromeOS.. as there is no DRM standard for HTML5 yet. (until WebCrypto is ready that is)

The netflix HTML5 limitation is a DRM issue (which is most likely a licensing issue with its content providers), not a technical issue..

What I want to know is, did Valve use the modder's code/work without compensation or at least attribution? Or did they pay for the work, even if it was open sourced afterwards. If the modders' work(s) were used to improve SteamOS, it would be the right thing (as well as good marketing/PR) to compensate the modders.

However, that could burn them in the future, should someone decide to try to sue over a similar feature implementation, etc.

Maybe they could post feature requests with a bounty? with modifiers based upon quality of code

They attributed the work to Ye Olde SteamOSe and the developers in their announcement post. As with any company-backed open-source venture, I'm sure a fair number of people will muck around with SteamOS just for fun.

What I want to know is, did Valve use the modder's code/work without compensation or at least attribution? Or did they pay for the work, even if it was open sourced afterwards. If the modders' work(s) were used to improve SteamOS, it would be the right thing (as well as good marketing/PR) to compensate the modders.

However, that could burn them in the future, should someone decide to try to sue over a similar feature implementation, etc.

Maybe they could post feature requests with a bounty? with modifiers based upon quality of code

lol, that's not quite the way the open source community and the GPL works. Anyway from what I gather is that the modders work was not improving the Steam client, which is not open source, but on improving the operation of the Debian system as a whole. This kind of flexibility and resources is what Linux provides.

What I want to know is, did Valve use the modder's code/work without compensation or at least attribution? Or did they pay for the work, even if it was open sourced afterwards. If the modders' work(s) were used to improve SteamOS, it would be the right thing (as well as good marketing/PR) to compensate the modders.

However, that could burn them in the future, should someone decide to try to sue over a similar feature implementation, etc.

Maybe they could post feature requests with a bounty? with modifiers based upon quality of code

They attributed the work to Ye Olde SteamOSe and the developers in their announcement post. As with any company-backed open-source venture, I'm sure a fair number of people will muck around with SteamOS just for fun.

Um.. isnt this a completely community driven project? I don't see any mention of Valve on the github page..

It seems like its just a steamOS fork.. i.e they have done this for fun or out of the goodness of their heart.. It also does not mean that their implementation is actually how Valve would have approached it had they done it themselves.. or that they even want to provide and/or support..

If Netflix would get their act together and get their HTML5 player up and running I'd install this on my HTPC

And even if they did move to HTML5, you'd have to <i>hope</i> that the DCE module they use for decrypting the DRM would even be available for Linux.

I suspect it never will be because there's no guarantee, ever, of a video/audio path that is secure against the end-user. DCE/HTML5 DRM requires user-hostile platforms, and so far SteamOS (and every other Linux platform) is anything but.

Netflix works fine on ChromeOS which does not have silverlight at all, so I am quite confident that a non silverlight/moonlight solution will be found for Linux as well.

I've seen people running it on nix systems with pipelight.. As for Netflix running in ChromeOS.. That doesnt really mean much as it already works in IE11 on windows 8.1 in HTML5 mode too.. but clearly there is some kind of specific built in DRM features that make it non compatible with normal HTML5 browsers (some kind of plugin?). So my guess is that Google has merely done the same thing in ChromeOS.. as there is no DRM standard for HTML5 yet. (until WebCrypto is ready that is)

The netflix HTML5 limitation is a DRM issue (which is most likely a licensing issue with its content providers), not a technical issue..

Can't speak to the actual implementation, but one of the biggest uproars over HTML5 <video> is that it was supposed to kill plugins... but DCE will essentially be a plugin, so it's an end-run around one of the intentions of <video>, which was to get rid of plugins in order to reduce browser attack surface.

If Netflix would get their act together and get their HTML5 player up and running I'd install this on my HTPC... But until that happens it's only going to be any good for toying around. But that's just me. If I didn't need Netflix support I'd install it today -- or now that it can dual boot I'd install it for fun side-by-side if I had the storage space. Speaking of which, I'll have to see how much space the install is..

Why would you need to? Isn't there a Flash option for Netflix? And isn't Flash widely available on Linux?

(honest questions, no trolling intended!)

/J

Nope. Netflix uses Silverlight, not Flash. And there is no official Silverlight port for Linux, and the unofficial one (Moonlight) does not support the DRM. Some people have gotten Netflix to run by bottling the Windows version of Firefox with Silverlight in WINE, but it's anything but straightforward, and not really suitable for HTPC use.

Since Linux treats everything like a "Device", could Linux be used to get 2+ different graphics cards to work together as a single gpu w/o SLI'ing / Crossfiring those suckers?

I just find it weird that SLI and Crossfire have restrictions. You plug GPU's into your mobo, yet the OS, drivers, etc else can't just farm out work to them up to their capacity for a single program, like a game.

I don't know enough about graphics cards to really understand this. Maybe someone can point me to a good resource to read up on. This comes after I upgraded the gfx card in my windows gaming box. Older and newer card are both nvidia. But, since they weren't the same type, I couldn't SLI them. So, all I could do is farm physx to the older card if I wanted to, leaving everything else to newer card. I just didn't understand why the comp can't treat multiple gpu cards like it treats dual/quad core cpu's, farming work to various ones. It's an OS thing, a program thing (programs have to be written to take advantage of it), etc. SLI / Crossfire does that hardware-wise, but can't do it unless the cards are the same? Just seems weird. If Linux could treat everything like a device, could it do that?

... I just didn't understand why the comp can't treat multiple gpu cards like it treats dual/quad core cpu's, farming work to various ones. It's an OS thing, a program thing (programs have to be written to take advantage of it), etc. SLI / Crossfire does that hardware-wise, but can't do it unless the cards are the same? Just seems weird. If Linux could treat everything like a device, could it do that?

In order to use SLI, a motherboard with an nForce4, nForce 500, nForce 600 or nForce 700 SLI chipset must be used, although with the use of hacks[7] one can make SLI work on motherboards with Intel, ATI and ULi chipsets. NVIDIA has stated that only their own chipsets can allow SLI to function optimally, and that they will not allow SLI to work on any other vendor's chipsets.Some early SLI systems used Intel's E7525 Xeon chipset, which caused problems when NVIDIA started locking out other vendor's chipsets as it limited them to an outdated driver set. In 2007, Intel has licensed NVIDIA's SLI technology for its SkullTrail platform, and select motherboards supporting the Intel X58 (Tylersburg) chipset have unlocked SLI capabilities. Not all X58 motherboards support this technology, as NVIDIA offered it to motherboard manufacturers at the cost of $5 per motherboard sold.[8] NOTE: As of the release of the AMD 900 chipset series, SLI can be run on an AMD mainboard provided that it has the 970, 990X, or 990FX chipset on the board.[9]

Sounds like a baked-in hardware limitation. Nvidia licenses SLI support to motherboard manufacturers. My guess is that AMD does the same with Crossfire.

Tundro Walker: What you want comes with a myriad of problems in implementation. The cards have different speeds, cores, memory, and technologies. The way it currently is done is like it is so that it is completely transparent to the game. Basically the system divides the screen in half and each card does one section. This can be done line by line or geographically (top vs bottom). For what you want to do to work, the games themselves would have to be coded to take advantage of the hardware you have. Thats a lot of possible combinations. And the game probably wouldn't work on a single card system at all.

If Netflix would get their act together and get their HTML5 player up and running I'd install this on my HTPC... But until that happens it's only going to be any good for toying around. But that's just me. If I didn't need Netflix support I'd install it today -- or now that it can dual boot I'd install it for fun side-by-side if I had the storage space. Speaking of which, I'll have to see how much space the install is..

Why would you need to? Isn't there a Flash option for Netflix? And isn't Flash widely available on Linux?

(honest questions, no trolling intended!)

/J

No, as far as I know Netflix web client is Silverlight.

There's not a Flash option for Netflix, and Adobe's gone into bug fix only mode for Flash 11.2 on Linux, with no further major updates for the platform planned. Hulu works perfectly, but Amazon Prime doesn't. It's possible to get Netflix working by installing a plugin called pipelight, which runs Silverlight through Wine, but you also have to install a user agent spoofer to fool Netflix into thinking you're running Windows. It works well once you've jumped through those hoops.

I just find it weird that SLI and Crossfire have restrictions. You plug GPU's into your mobo, yet the OS, drivers, etc else can't just farm out work to them up to their capacity for a single program, like a game.

The reason is data bandwidth. The way multiple GPU configurations work is by rendering segments of the screen (top and bottom half, for example), and then having the "master" card recombine them into the final image. The problem is that this means that all the data from all of the slave cards needs to be sent simultaneously to the master card, in real-time, while the master card itself is processing as well. Your motherboard's chipset simply does not have the required bandwidth to push all that data through at once. There's actually a driver based SLI implementation that can be used on older cards with lower bandwidth requirements on mobos without an SLI bridge, but there's a significant performance penalty to doing this. An SLI bridge is a direct connection between the video cards, allowing them to share data directly without bottlenecking on your motherboard's chipset.

There's not a Flash option for Netflix, and Adobe's gone into bug fix only mode for Flash 11.2 on Linux, with no further major updates for the platform planned. Hulu works perfectly, but Amazon Prime doesn't. It's possible to get Netflix working by installing a plugin called pipelight, which runs Silverlight through Wine, but you also have to install a user agent spoofer to fool Netflix into thinking you're running Windows. It works well once you've jumped through those hoops.

The problem is that they managed to sneak proprietary blobs into the HTML5 spec, to be able to play DRM'ed videos. So it's plugin-less in name only.

Will the new installer with the "advanced options" for dual booting allow me to install SteamOS on a partition smaller than the 500 GB in the initial requirements?

I would much prefer to install it on a 120 GB SSD I have laying around. I'll be streaming games anyway once that options appears (beta invites are going out now) and don´t need half a gig for local games...

/J

The installer has never actually checked drive size. I think the OS itself needs something like 40GB for itself and the recovery partition and all - it's installed just fine on 120GB drives for me.

Thanks Andrew. Looks like I've run out if excuses for not installing it then ... :-)

Note to your editors desk: the next Ars System builder article should include at least one home brew SteamBox.

Very well actually. I have a script set to launch it with Advanced Launcher. Create an .sh file , chmod +x that file, with these contents:

#!/bin/bashsteam %u

I also have modifications to mine to unload and load xboxdrv before and after since I use xboxdrv to enable use of the 360 controller as a mouse and such, and SteamOS and big picture don't like anything else besides plain ol' xpad as a module, for the most part. Most of this is on my *nix site (www.thelinuxcauldron.com). I'll be more than happy to help you.

Andrew Cunningham / Andrew has a B.A. in Classics from Kenyon College and has over five years of experience in IT. His work has appeared on Charge Shot!!! and AnandTech, and he records a weekly book podcast called Overdue.